The present invention pertains to a terminal assembly and particularly one which joins a conductor to a terminal for subsequent attachment to a battery or other electrical device.
In order to electrically couple one or more batteries of, for example, a battery pack to a device to be powered by the battery pack, typically wire assemblies are used which include a flat conductive terminal which is spot-welded to the battery. Soldered to the terminal is a wire conductor. The junction of the conductor and terminal typically is sealed using a heat shrinkable insulating sleeve of polyvinyl chloride.
The manufacturing steps, thus, require the wire to be first soldered to the terminal, utilizing conventional soldering techniques, and subsequently a heat-shrinkable tubing placed over the junction of the wire and terminal and heat-shrunk into place providing a water-tight seal for the interface between the wire and terminal. The terminal is subsequently spot-welded to a battery terminal and the conductor extends from the battery and may be terminated in a suitable snap-on lug, depending upon the device to which the battery pack is to be coupled. Preformed heat-shrinkable tubes including solder rings surrounding an end of a terminal fitted to the tubes, which were then heat activated to connect conductors of the terminals, have been employed. However, such a structure requires the manufacture of a particular shape of preformed tube significantly adding to the expense and complexity of the product and manufacturing process.
Such termination of a wire requires multiple steps during manufacturing of preformed heat-shrinkable tubes or terminal assemblies, which require both soldering steps and forming and heat-shrinking of the tubing, typically done at different locations and/or multiple processing stations by different personnel. This is costly due to the time involved, as well as equipment and manpower required to complete the manufacturing.